More than $260k spent on public notices over past two years

Destiny Cruz | Monday, November 6th 2023

The Government of Guam has expended more than $250,000 over the past two years on public notices, a revelation that came to light during an informational briefing held by Senator Roy Quinata on Monday.

The briefing aimed to shed light on the expenses associated with public notices mandated by the Open Government Law, highlighting the financial burden faced by government agencies.

Government agencies in Guam are required to adhere to the Open Government Law, disseminating public notices to inform the community about potential impacts.

While these notices are essential for fostering transparency and accountability, Quinata delved into the costs incurred by traditional methods, such as newspapers, urging the exploration of alternative media platforms. Quinata suggests,

“By doing so, we can ensure the effective dissemination of information to the public in order to tackle those challenges and uncover opportunities to enhance public awareness by saving the government expenses.”

There were 15 GovGuam agency heads that appeared before the legislature to disclose their spending on public and bidding notices in fiscal year 2022-2023.

Not including the Department of Land Management, whose applicants pay for public notices by way of the land use commission process, 14 agencies spent over 260 thousand dollars over a two year period.

Among the agencies, the Department of Public Health was one of the highest spenders, allocating approximately $82,000-$83,000 for 344 notices published over the two years.

Similarly, the Department of Public Works and the Guam Election Commission reported increased spending in FY22 and FY23, respectively.

In addition to exploring public notice costs, Senator Quinata investigated the expenses related to the destruction of stored documents within GovGuam agencies. Some agencies, like Public Health, faced significant costs related to sanitization and destruction of records.

Quinata raised concerns about the expenses and questioned agencies on their efforts to digitize records. 

Public Health, for instance, is in the process of data management upgrades and is considering storing documents digitally to reduce costs.

Land Management, while not incurring costs for document destruction, is also working on digitizing records, with an unsolicited proposal received to digitize the remaining paper records

Source: https://www.kuam.com/story/49954908/more-than-dollar260k-spent-on-public-notices-over-past-two-years